We started out as the Ashe County Council on Aging in 1977, small, but with driving purpose and compassion to ensure the needs of our community were met. Now, decades later, our passion for people continues to be the center of our mission.....to connect, to embrace and to enrich the lives of those we are blessed to be a part of.
We were first located in the old Ashe County Hospital building on McConnell Street in Jefferson where we offered congregate and home delivered meals, transportation and chore services. We had a Senior Center but there was no funding for the program when we first started.
In the early 1980’s we began providing In-Home Aide services and were one of the first agencies in the State of North Carolina to provide this. We also were one of five sites in North Carolina selected to participate in a pilot program for the Community Alternatives Program (CAP). Today, we are the lead agency in Ashe County for the CAP/DA program and we are proud to continue to deliver excellent In-Home Aide services to our community.
In 1993, in order to establish ourselves as an independent entity, we changed our name to Ashe Services for Aging, Inc. Many people believe that we are a County owned and operated organization; however we are a 501(c)(3) private non-profit agency. We do have strong relationships with our County and their various departments and enjoy working with our County to ensure the needs of our community are met through ongoing collaborations.
In 1996 we were fortunate to have the opportunity to move to a much larger space, which is our current location on 180 ChattyRob Lane in West Jefferson. We are seated on a beautiful 18-acre campus which has served us well as we have continued to grow and expand our services.
Soon after we moved to our new location, we were pleased to begin offering Adult Day Care and Child Day Care services through an intergenerational model that is, to this day, a unique program and is one of only a few such facilities state-wide.
In the late 1990’s, we received start-up funding from the local council of governments to house a county Volunteer Program that not only recognized the valuable volunteer contributions to our county but also focused on volunteer recruitment. Our County government has been extremely supportive of this program and has continued to fund the program after the start-up funding had been expended. We are proud to house this program on our campus and to work with all of the agencies in the county that could not survive without their amazing volunteers.
In 2002 we added Ashe Senior Village, Inc. to our campus, which consists of twenty-four single unit apartments for low-income individuals age 62 and older. The proximity of the complex to our Senior Center provides residents with the opportunity to participate in all Senior Center activities, including congregate meals, educational programs and classes.
As we continued to grow, we began looking toward the future. We were aware that the need for our services would continue to increase, but that financial support may vary. There, Ashe Services for Aging Foundation, Inc. was established in 2005 to help sustain and expand services and programs offered by Ashe Services for Aging through advocacy and fundraising activities.
We continued to expand our scope of services when we opened our assisted living and memory care facility in 2011. Our assisted living is licensed by the State of North Carolina to provide Adult Care personal care services throughout our assisted living building, and is licensed as a Special Care Unit in our Memory Care Program for persons with Alzheimer’s disease or related disorders. We are proud to offer assisted living services as part of our continuum of care.
In December 2020, we completed a major rebrand of our organization, resulting in a new name and new logo. Since the adoption of the name ‘Ashe Services for Aging’, many things have changed for our organization, from the addition of an intergenerational day program to our assisted living community for those who need more support. Our new name, Generations Ashe, reflects the organization’s need for an identity that better describes who we are and what we do. While the former name served us well for decades, the new name further strengthens our longstanding commitment to bringing people of ALL ages together through social gatherings, volunteer opportunities, and educational events.
We believe in meeting people where they are and assisting them in whatever stage of life they may find themselves. We are proud of our history and service to our community and are committed to continuing our mission for many years to come.
Connecting people. Embracing challenges. Enriching lives…from generation to generation.